St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1887-10-22
TOADS AND THEIR PREY.
ecaliar FrOvlssoas n NstsFo ~ VIM
They Can Eat looeets.

ToADs AND THEIR PREY.
Aec.liar rrovIsse.s q Nat.rs - whse
They Can Eat laseets.
recently spent five or six hours o
steamboat in company with
stranger from Brookville-a modest
intelligent man, full twenty years m
Junior. Just as we were nearing tn
city Of Bangor the remark OF a thir'
party led me to say that the most curl
Gus thing he had ever seen in his Lii
was on occasion Of his splitting hug
bowlder in field that he might us
the pieces Cor stone wall, and finding
in the center Of it great fat toad. L
his report was true it would seem thai
the toad must have crawled in or Taller
into the fissure in the first year Of hi.
life, and have found in there sufficient
supply of insects. either crawling in Of
fallen in. to sustain his life for four Ol
Eve years.
Ipresume you are all aware OF the
peculiar manner in which the toad.
seizes his prey. The root Of his tongue
is fastened in the very front Of his up.
per Jaw, while the tip lies far down his
throat 1t thus lies directly over his
windpipe. and he would not be able to
breathe were not his tongue perforated
in the middle. exactly in the right
place. 80 that it can act opening or
contracting. somewhat in the manner
of the CLOTHS. When he sees any mov-
ing thing which he judges to be an 10.
sect, he throws the tip of his tongue
out with great accuracy Of aim, picks
the insect up. and thrusts it down his
throat with the rapidity Of lightning.
Lay down an apple core or little piece
of single smeared with molasses near
a toad and you must watch very sharply
to see how it is that he 50 rapidly
transfers every fly that settles on your
bait to his own stomach.
The accuracy Of aim in the young
.oad is similar to the accuracy with
which the young quail Or chicken picks
up grain. A young chicken. having
only its head out of the shell. picked
up a fly that lighted near it. And.
said Mr.. CSlthrop. when you consider
the nice cooperation Of nervous and
muscular movements necessary to this
feat. you will preceive that the chicken
must have been practicing hy-catching
in the person Of its ancestry for thou
sands or millions Of years. But once
had curious proof that the toad is capa-
bic Of improvement by practice. Under
a beehive in = garden at Cambridge I
observed for several successive sum-
mers toad watching for overloaded
bees who failed to reach the threshold
of the hive. No sooner did they fall on
the ground than he snapped them up.
But one day saw he had lost by some
accident his right eye. and when he
struck at bee he lost his aim. and
picked up dirt from one side of the
bee. He wiped his mouth with his fore
paw and tried again and again. The
bee generally managed to climb to the
top of some little prominence on the
ground and fly away before the toad
succeeded. The poor fellow was halt
starved and grew thin but l observed
that before the summer was ended he
had learned to aim rs correctly with
one eye as he used to with two. and had
again recovered his plumpness.
The toad's tongue usually puts things
down his throat so nicely that he does
not need much power of swallowing.
but he occasionally needs it and is
forced to make up by mother wit what
is lacking in the powers Of his throat.
You will observe this most frequently
in his attempt to take grass-hopper
ar locust. A toad will frequently At
tack an object that is really too large
for him to get into his mouth at all.
Thus have seen one attempt q huge
of q sphinx. and I have
known of one undertaking a wounded
bird. In this case it was a
perfect failure. But when toad has
transferred the head Of a large locust
to his stomach. and finds the hind legs
and tail still protruding from his mouth.
he usually turns to the nearest stone or
fence and pushes the grass-hopper's
legs against the obstacle until he has
rammcd it into his mouth. 1t would |
seem from this that his stomach is |
capable of considerable mechanical ex- |
tension without giving pain. And
we're his stomach not somewhat insensi-
bic. he would neither be capable of en-
Turing the long fasts to which he must
sometimes submit nor Of INDUCING
with impunity in the feasting and over
.ating which we sometimes observe in
,im Rosfon (1iohe